Moscow car bomb wounds former aide to pro-Russian Ukrainian politician

A car bomb in Moscow wounded a onetime spokesman for a pro-Russian former prime minister of Ukraine today, Russian investigators say, the second such explosion in the country in two days.

Sergei Zavorotniy, once a top aide to Mykola Azarov — Ukraine’s prime minister from 2010 to 2014 — was hospitalized after a car he was driving blew up on a street in Chertanovo, a district of the Russian capital, the investigators’ statement says.

Moscow has blamed Ukraine for previous assassinations of senior military officials and people linked to Russia.

There is no immediate comment from Ukraine.

Ren TV and the 112 Telegram channel both report that Zavorotniy had lost his left arm in the attack and is in hospital with a concussion, rib fractures and other injuries.

Russia’s Investigative Committee, which handles serious crimes, said it is investigating the incident.

Zavorotniy’s former boss Azarov fled to Russia in 2014, when Ukrainian street protests, which became known as the Maidan Revolution, ousted pro-Russian president Viktor Yanukovych after he backed away from a pledge to develop closer ties with the European Union.

Azarov tells Russia’s TASS state news agency that he has no information about the car bomb, except that Zavorotniy had survived.

The explosion is the latest in a series of apparent assassination attempts inside Russia. Yesterday, a member of the Russian military was killed by a car bomb in St Petersburg.